


Black Roses

by Kingmaking



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Canon-Typical Underage, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Gen, Murder, Regicide, dub-con, elinor has issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-05-02 21:03:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14553474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kingmaking/pseuds/Kingmaking
Summary: Elinor Costayne becomes a self-made widow.





	Black Roses

**Author's Note:**

> This doesn't make 100% perfect sense anymore now that F&B is out ,,,  
> But kingkilling!Elinor lives on in my heart . Also this fic is a secret fav of mine sooo

Elinor had never been disturbed by the sight of blood.

Blood was aplenty, in a woman's life, more than men who hit one another with little blades while fighting in little wars might ever suspect. There was the blood on her fingers whenever she cut them on a rose's thorn, the blood of her flowering… There was even blood flowing down her shoulders, when the light was dim and made the flame-red tresses she'd inherited from her mother shine like bloodstone, thick and wavy, curling splendidly in the heat of Reach summers.

*

The blood that had come gushing from her little brother Tommen's broken arm when he'd fallen down a branch, snapping the bone so badly that it'd torn his skin and stuck out. Elinor hadn't been able to look away, as her family's old Maester did what little he could, there and then on the blood-soaked ground. Tom had screamed -- screamed, for his flesh had been torn from his bones -- until the only sound left had been that of her lady Mother's weeping. Her eyes were glassy, her face pale, as if the blood had also been removed from her own body. It was Elinor, aged ten, who'd escorted her mother back to her chambers. Fingers sticky with blood, she’d walked into the room a child and left a young woman.

She hadn't noticed how the yellow skirt of her gown was positively dripping with blood until later, when she'd followed the maester around the castle, silently, to watch how the serving folk reacted when told of Tom's death.

Elinor had dreamed of Tom, and thought his death a terrible scene indeed, the worst she’d ever seen, until the day of her mother’s seventh labor. Not a year after, because Father had thought a new baby might help Lady Costayne feel better about watching the last one bleed out. She'd bled out herself, that day; they'd put her in the ground with her seventh child, a grey thing who didn't have a name. The holy number, Lord Costayne had later told his children, to make them feel better. But of these seven, only Elinor, Justin and Gawen were left, so it really wasn't that helpful.

*

The blood of her deflowering. A rose had also been responsible for this, although this one was dressed in green, riding from wealthy Highgarden to visit Elinor's lord Father, leaving with a bloody sword, a smiling face, having stabbed more than just a finger. Elinor had been left with little, herself, safe for a cup of tea procured by her gallant knight, tansy and pennyroyal, a hint of mint. That, and the knowledge that she'd at least been able to decide on the man who'd first taken her to bed... Although it'd been a table in the kitchens, not a bed. Uncomfortable, rough, bloody; a sign of what the Seven had in store for Elinor Costayne if there'd ever been any. It'd been a little secret between Elinor and her knight, for years after, when he'd taken some Tarly girl to wife and she'd been sent east to marry the eldest son of a landed knight.

Theo was good enough, for a husband. Close to House Baratheon, but he'd obliged Elinor when she'd asked him to move to King's Landing -- how could he refuse her, after she'd just birthed him a third son? Bolling Keep smelled; King's Landing would stink even more, she knew, but at least there'd be more to do. Ormund and Orys had followed in the wheelhouse, Olyvar had followed at her breast, and Elinor had counted the days until she could behold a dragon for the first time.

'Don't you fear the King?' Theo had asked. She was nineteen and he was twenty-seven, but after they'd moved to King's Landing, his face would pale whenever he caught sight of a Targaryen banner.

Elinor had counted every head she could spot, planted on pikes along the gates of the Red Keep. She had stopped at twenty-four, but only because Theo had asked her to please stop mouthing the numbers aloud. They'd settled into rooms that were better than anything she was used to, had met some of the other nobles and watched the children grow... for a month. On the day Elinor's eldest had turned four, men of the Kingsguard had come to arrest his father, charge him with high treason and bring down the headsman's axe.

Elinor had traded her yellow gown for a black one. From her window, she’d counted the pikes once more and reached forty-six.

*

Seven days after this, King Maegor had commanded her to marry him. Rhaena Targaryen had been silent during the ceremony, eyes clouded with black rage; Jeyne Westerling had wept. Elinor had thought of how it wouldn't be so hard, to bring a fourth son into the world; that's what the King wanted. When he'd come to her bed, that night, a new bed in a new set of rooms, she'd dug her fingers into his back, like a dragon's claws, and poked fun at how nobody would buy into the story of how the mild, meek Knight of Bolling had committed treason.

The King had shown her what the opposite of a meek, mild husband was, until there were seventy-two pikes lining the gates and she was pregnant. Rhaena had fled; Jeyne had perished in childbirth, until Elinor was the last Queen. Maegor had made her first boy a ward of Highgarden, the second of Lord Arryn; he'd named her brother Gawen to his Kingsguard and found a bride of Hightower blood for Justin, the future Lord Costayne. The stars of Costayne had shone bright... then flickered out, dying with her baby.

A monstrous atrocity; ninety-five pikes outside the city. Elinor wondered if her King would execute her; she wondered if the pikes would ever be taken down.

Maegor had not killed her, the way he'd killed so many before. Was it because she was the last wife left to him? Elinor doubted it; the man knew nothing of love. He'd come to her bed, before she was fully recovered from the birth. There'd been some blood, but then it was nothing she hadn't seen before.

A hundred and twelve pikes lined the gates and the King's last nephew was coming for him -- for them. Maegor wouldn't back down, of course; Elinor could understand that, in a way. He was sure to lose his life, if he surrendered. And he was a kinslayer, accursed in the eyes of the Seven.

He wouldn't back down, and every night he did his best to put a new son in Elinor. Every morning, she drank the cup of lukewarm, bitter tea Gawen brought her, pennyroyal and tansy. Her brother had offered to find her some honey, but Elinor rather like the bitter taste.

*

Which was worse: kinslaying or kingslaying? They'd know soon enough.

*

The new Lord of Highgarden's memory of Elinor was a most pleasant one, indeed; he swore on the Seven to keep her eldest boy safe, no matter what King Maegor commanded, the way the Hightowers had refused to behead Rhaena's little girl after she'd fled. She couldn't hope to get such a promise from Lord Arryn, of course; instead, her brother Justin and his wife took Oldtown's fastest ship up the eastern coast and were staying at the Gates of the Moon, until news came that...

Elinor didn't know how she'd do it, but she knew what color she'd wear. The pale yellow of House Costayne, with soft fur lining the skirt, the collar and the sleeves. She didn't like it this much -- she had better ones, gowns of velvet and silk, adorned with gemstones and Myrish lace, but she didn't want to end up having to burn them. Costayne yellow could get dirty; Costayne yellow might even look good, with a King's blood on it.

There would have to be at least some of it. Gawen had promised to keep his brothers in the Kingsguard away, but Elinor wouldn't need long. The King was dead already -- what did it matter, if he was killed by his wife or by his nephew's army? Her brother had refused to do it himself. 'I could never get close enough,' he'd used as his excuse. Maybe he was right, but Elinor had called him a coward anyway.

She herself planned to be very close, indeed, when she watched her King bleed out, sent him to meet his makers. He'd almost been good to her, in bed; he'd almost given her a son, he'd almost won the war. But now he was like a rotting apple, about to plummet down, the way poor little Tommen had. She wouldn't let him bring her down; she wouldn't let him break her bones.

A hundred and fifty-four pikes lined the gates on the day Elinor decided time had come.

*

The King's men bowed to her as she walked into his Throne Room, eager to leave it themselves. Elinor soon understood why; below the Iron Throne, on a pike, was the head of Lord… Was it Rosby? Hayford? Oh, definitely Hayford, with his white beard and his easy smile, even in death. A hundred and fifty-five.

The King was sitting on the Iron Throne, eyes half-shut. 'Majesty,' Elinor greeted him; he waved a hand in return, almost like a command. Almost like a master calling a dog -- not for long, now. Like she'd done a dozen times before, in this very room, Elinor tugged at the collar of her gown, let the sleeves glide over her arms, soft and warm, until she was half-naked.

She climbed every step, carefully, as Maegor bid her closer.

Like she'd done a dozen times before, she knelt in front of the Iron Throne, looked at the blades. A death trap, it was. The King looked down at her, closed his purple eyes... And gasped in surprise when she got back up, pushing him back into the blades with every drop of strength in her body, pushing until his eyes widened and his mouth opened. Maybe it was meant to be a scream, but only blood came, Targaryen red, flame-hot as it splattered her own throat. His arms scratched on the blades, a hand grasped at Elinor’s skirt, tugging until the fabric ripped, but it was done.

Elinor kissed Maegor, tasted blood in her King's mouth; like regicide and freedom, like victory over a man who'd never been defeated before and had now been, by her, the littlest Black Bride, the last queen. It tasted like how Jeyne had smelled, how Elinor's mother had smelled, a killer from within. She ran her tongue over Maegor's own. Limp, it was, with clattering teeth and some gargle in his throat, like he wanted to speak. To curse her name, maybe, but Elinor wouldn't let him do that. She’d heard enough already.

She put her bloody hand over his mouth, shushed him like one would a child. 'We don't want anyone walking in on us, do we? A naked queen, that is a sight for her King only.'

Naked and covered in her King's blood. Once he'd stopped trashing under her, Elinor rose from the Iron Throne, taking a step or two back to look at her once-mighty husband. The scene of Tom’s death had been horrible, but this was beautiful. She would return to her rooms, write her family and put her best gown -- red -- on for tomorrow morning, when she'd find the King dead. Oh, how she would scream. She would cry and collapse, and when Jaehaerys Targaryen arrived, she would beg and plead for mercy, like would be expected of her. She would say: _I was forced_ ; she would say: _I found him like this_.

She would command his men to leave him there, for Targaryens and Velaryons and Baratheons to behold, the monster defeated.

There was blood running down his arms from the blades, blood running down his throat and his chest, barely noticeable on the black of his doublet. But he'd always been so pale, as Targaryens oft tended to be; a blade shot through his neck and out his chin, crimson on cream. A troubling sight, but then...

Elinor had never been disturbed by the sight of blood.


End file.
